Hi,

Earlier this year I visited a Chinese restaurant in Weil am Rhein which I later reviewed:

http://www.bastronomy.com/?p=104

Recently a comment was added to the review - and the writer is entitled to his opinions.

One point I take issue with is about bringing babies to restaurants - should it be avoided? Even in the afternoon when the restaurant is otherwise empty?

Rgds,
Nick

I have clarified your quote below, and added a suitable daveA-esque response to you site. Obviously posts like his stir up interest , but in my opinion he comes across as a prententious tosser.

dave

You didn't state in your article it was afternoon.

I think unless it is a real family restaurant babies should be kept out in the evening (I say that as a parent of a 7 month old). If you want a nice evening together as a couple it's quite unpleasant to have kids screaming around.

Aside from that his comments are crap, any restaurant should be courteous and polite to their guests at all times. Even politely saying they couldn't accept the additional 7 would have been fine in my eyes, much better than trying to punish you through the meal.

I certainly don't have a problem when people bring their babies to restaurants, and it has never caused me any stress when a neighbouring table does so.

The only time I ever get annoyed at kids in restaurants is when their parents let them run riot.

Maybe this dude is just old, set in his ways, and hates children

Babies will do what babies do, which is generally loud, messy and fun. Depending on the natures of the establishment, it can make or break the atmosphere of a place. I luv 'em. They bring down to earth the most pompous of waiters with just a spray of flicked-vomit.

dave

For me babies rate along with dogs: other people's are all nice and dandy when they show them briefly and then take them away. But I certainly don't appreciate being entertained by the antics others' offspring or pets when I am paying good money to eat out...

I think it's clear that not all restaurants welcome babies or young children and I can fully understand that not all guests want to be entertained by the childrens' antics. For that reason, when we take our children to a restaurant we usually chose to go to an Italian restaurant (or the famous Scottish Restaurants ) - it's been our experience that such places seem to be more children friendy.

Let's face it, if your baby (or dog for AbFab) cannot "behave" in public then you might think twice about visiting a restaurant.

Given that's usually the minority, go ahead.

I'd say the comment is from someone with a considerably smaller social circle than you. Service is about the customer - most places would not create a fuss.

I'd get over my trip to the place and the comment quite easily btw

You may not like this, but having worked in restaurants for many years (both front of house and kitchen), I don't find this guy's comment at all offensive. He took the time to write a proper comment, which I think was quite constructive.

The one thing he should not have said was that the restaurant could do without guests such as yourself. He does not represent the restaurant.

Even if the restaurant was quiet, you didn't know that until you turned up. To go from a booking for 10 to seating 17 is nearly double the number. This can have certain repercussions (depending on the restaurant, the kitchen might prep to accommodate). What would you have done if there was not space for 17? Left to find another place, leaving the restaurant 10 bookings down? In short, if you are anticipating a larger crowd, call and change the booking for a range.

Or are we to assume that Chinese restaurants can accommodate the chaos? I bet you would not do this if you were fine-dining. I think unless it's McDonalds, certain protocol applies.

When things go wrong they can snowball and end up going pear-shaped and your commenter is right about that. After a bad start, every action becomes scrutinized and judged. Having been a chef I suffer from this stigma of being overly critical, so everything sucks. I hate nothing more than being told a culinary lie.

Also, wine and Chinese food never occurred to me. It's a cold beer meal to me. There are too many sweet-sour components to complement a wine.

Regarding babies, I think the restaurant determines. It's a raging debate and I feel there are certainly restaurants that accommodate babies. Family restaurants, of which Chinese are usually the type. I would not take a baby to a Michelin rated restaurant for example, so it depends on the establishment.

If a restaurant accommodates babies, they should do so properly.

If you leave a review and are open to comments, consider yourself lucky that you didn't get someone saying 'first'.

Nick,

Based on this and a recent posting on your other Blog, maybe you should just avoid Chinese restaurants altogether . Have you tried a good Indian lately

Pat

Why does one book for 10 people? To reserve a place with a pleasant view? To make sure the group can sit together? to make sure the table is set for 10? If the restaurant has taken the trouble to arrange things for 10 it is quite frustrating to have 17 turn up.
Whether they take the extras in their stride or not depends on a lot of other things.
If I were planning to take 3 very small children (bigger ones don't necessarily need the strap between the legs), I would have said this clearly on making the booking (with emphasis on the very small) to ensure that 3 high-chairs were available! And then there would be reason to complain if the straps were missing.
At least some of the positive comments from the 'opposition' have no real relevance for an event he wasn't present at. Since negative reports can have such adverse effects on a restaurant, he might have been better advised to hope that you go again and are more satisfied!
A different thought.
I wonder how long after your run this meal took place.
Quite apart from being tired and hungry, I wonder if the blood lactate wasn't still a bit high from the exercise. I don't know about you, but my tolerance level is WAY down if I have been swimming, running, walking or biking hard enough to push it up. Irrespective of how long after the event the comments were written, the feelings present at the time would come back to the surface.

Children in restuarants who are well behaved are fine by me. My oldest son has been going to restuarants with us since he was a baby, we always went early for dinner or for lunch. He always behaves wonderfully, I took him to lunch recently in a grown ups place & he behaved as well as any adult there at the age of seven. My youngest however is totally different I would not inflict him on any fellow dinner.

if there're going to be extra guests, the party should at least be prepared to be seated separately. depending on the restaurant layout, additional guests would also affect the reservation layout plans for the day/evening.

Hi Gooner,

Thank you for adding the benefit of your experience.

I don't begrudge the poster his opinions - far from it as I'm happy to have people contributing to the site (plug plug etc etc); and his comments are put politely on concisely. If I was afraid of negative comments, I would have closed comments on the site long ago. The world would be a boring place if we all agreed on everything.

The other thing is the poster based his comment on what he read and of course I forgot to mention our visit was a late lunchtime one - my fault.

In response to there being more people than we booked for; at the time I booked (a week before) I mentioned that this is roughly the number (based on how many people turned up the same time a year ago) however it can vary and that I would let them know if it should change. On the day itself when more people had showed up than expected (a feature of hashing I am afraid), I tried a few times over a couple of hours to phone the restaurant but nobody bothered to pick up - again not mentioned in the review - again my fault.

Whenever we take our 15 m.o. to a restaurant, we choose the place very carefully - i.e. does it have a lot of space for pushchair, place to change a nappy etc; are the staff efficient etc. We also time our visit around his routine - i.e. in the daytime and not when he is due for a nap. 99% of the time he is good as gold and for that other 1% we endeavour to leave as quickly as possible. Many restaurants in Basel are child-friendly and in fact that is one of the things I try to touch on in any restaurant review.

With regard to wine with Chinese food - why not? At least my Ken Hom cookbook gives some recommendations. In the case of the wine at the restaurant, the first bottle they sent was corked - an independent issue from whether or not it was suited to the food. And surely the restaurant should be able to base a wine menu on what best compliments the food?

Overall, I think the "restaurant experience" starts from the point where you make the booking and continues through to after you pay the bill and leave. Any small fault that is not - within reason - corrected by the restaurant is bound to lead the customer to be critical of other faults - however minor.

In response to Longbyt's post about lactate levels: fair point but no matter how bad the service gets in a place I remain the model of politeness at all times; it helps me to maintain the psychological advantage when waiters do get stroppy.

Cheers,
Nick

Everybody is indeed entitled to their opinions, and not everybody thinks the same. You see this all the time on places like Tripadvis*r... one person has a wonderful time whereas others see the mould and the noise...

I remember one review I did there, along the lines of: I stood on broken glass on their private beach, there were cockroaches, and the hotel charged my credit card twice (all of which was true...) and someone else added another comment that the place was magnificent and they had a wonderful time and my comments were unhelpful and patronising...

I think that the restaurant did very well in finding 3 highchairs for your group. You did plan this event, so you could have taken your own chair along. Many places in Zug only have one chair available.

As for taking babies to a restaurant, sure if you are on holiday, but meeting up with friends at the park or for dinner parties at home is far more practical. The baby can't eat much on the menu anyway

Hi Nick,

Taking all of this into consideration, you are right to review the restaurant as you did. You did make an effort to contact them and had chosen a place, based on previous experience, that could accommodate all of you and the occasion.

You had an unsatisfactory experience and I'm sure your perceptions are correct. Like too much else in life, it is by process of elimination that you find out what you don't like more often than finding what you do.

Keep up the reviews and I hope to find a few gems through Bastronomy.

PS. I still would never order wine in a Chinese restaurant.

Tsing Tao.

Tripadvis*r is great. You can generally tell the whingers from the legit complaints. I always use it for evaluating hotels. It's rarely wrong if there are more than 10 reviews. You need a diversity of opinions to cover all bases...

dave

You underestimate many babies. Our little one is very cosmopolitan with his tastes - for example we regularly have Friday lunch at an Indian buffet place in Basel and take him along; and he eats everything they have including chicken jalfraizi, vegetable korma, dhal, naan bread, tandoori chicken. At home he eats the same as us, including things like chilli con carne, tagines, cous cous, pasta, chorizo, most fruits and vegetables. Not all kids are McD's addicts.

The other week we were at a restaurant in Yorkshire with my parents and we all gave J. small portions off our plates and it all went down; plus he was a model of behaviour throughout.

My take is: the more we take him to eat out - in addition to proper family meals at the table at home, the quicker he will be able to assimilate correct table manners and learn to enjoy such occasions. So many times I see parents with kids who clearly rarely go out and those are the ones who don't know how to behave.

Cheers,
Nick

Too right....from Google Ads I have made almost $5 in about 2 years! It almost pays for the hosting.

Cheers,
Nick